crew assignment production report

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Alice Nightingale Crew Assignment Production File

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Crew Assignment: Production File

Barista

Initially working on the Barista project was suggested to me by Tom

Dowler, who knew at the end of first year that my area of interest was

leaning towards Flash and 2D animation. I attended the third year pitches

at the Poly and was impressed by the stylistic look that Alex wanted to

achieve and how much of the story he had already planned. Tom

introduced me to Alex, and I expressed my interest in working for him

and it was decided I would work on the project as an animator.

My Role

Although it was originally decided that I would work on the project solely

as an animator, this role changed drastically throughout production as

various changes and technical problems meant that the large crew Alex

was initially assigned ended up being whittled down, leaving the two of

us not just to animate the main body of the project but to produce,

organise, create, edit and direct it as well. This is something I never

expected to happen, but I feel I have taken the changes to my role, and

the pressures and workload that came with it, in my stride. Consideringthe setbacks we have had to encounter, the two of us have managed to

create a five and a half minute film which we intend to see to completion

in time for the September screenings in London.

The Team

The original designated team of second years and their roles to work on

Barista were:

Alice Nightingale (me) 2D Animation Charlie Minnion 2D Animation Hugh Herbert 3D effects and Modelling Joe Hill Textures / Foley / Animation Ass istant Alberto Montana 2D Animation Thomas Spettel 2D Animation

Tom Gameson 2D Animation Rozi Barnes Background / some Concept art

Of these, the ones that remained working on Barista are:

Myself 2D Animation/Co-Producer/Co-Director/Editing Charlie Composting/Post-Production Hugh 3D Modelling (not used in hand-in, due to script cutbacks,

will be used in finished film)

Joe some Textures / Foley


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The main reason for team cutbacks were due to unforeseen software

compatibility issues that were only discovered after production had

began. Without knowing, Alex and I had both purchased copies of the

second version of Animate, there are no visible differences between the

two versions or their output, other than that the two versions are not

backwards (or even forwards) compatible, this reason was only

discovered after Alex had sent many querying emails to ToonBoom asking

why they wouldnt work. We had wondered whether the compatibility

issues were due to Alex having a Mac and the studio computers being

Windows, however this was disregarded as we had no compatibility

issues between my PC and his Mac (the only troubles came when using

external hard-drives to transfer files that were formatted to one system

and therefore read only on the others computer). This meant that all the

scenes that had been prepared for the others to start work on couldnt be

accessed by them, Alex made the decision to use his time to animate tothe standard he wanted rather than re-prepare the scenes and then have

to spend time cleaning up the work others completed for him. This was

especially frustrating for Charlie who worked on a scene with two

stickmen and kept having to tweak it again and again for about two

weeks when Alex managed to redo the same scene how he wanted in a

day or two.

Expectations

The role was certainly not as I expected it to be when I approached Alexback in the first term. The cutback of team members meant that Alex

became more reliant on me as the project progressed. I ended up

assigning and prioritising the workload between us and organising Alex.

This project has been by far the hardest thing I have worked on during the

course so far, but I feel it has also been the most rewarding and the one I

am proudest of. I feel that my effort has been truly appreciated and

acknowledged by Alex, who, without my asking, has credited me in the

final hand-in with the role of co-producer and co-director.

Creative Development

and Career Considerations

Working on Barista has been a steep learning curve, before starting the

project I had never touched Animate and now I feel like I havent used

another program to animate (with the exception of creating the animatic

in Flash) for months. Alex has also allowed me to have a lot of creative

input in the film, helping him to edit the script, create the majority of the

animatic and create characters (which I will go into more detail aboutlater) and animate them. I have also been allowed quite a lot of creative

freedom with the scenes Id been given to work with, Alex believed I

knew the story, characters and style well enough to be able to and would

be able to create my own interpretation of the scene that he would be

happy with without strict direction. Alex also showed his trust in me by

giving me the opportunity to design the third main character, Carol, who

pre-existed in the story as a stick figure, until some feedback from Derek

convinced Alex it would be more interesting (and fitting with the rest of

as yet the unanimated story) if she was to become a real character. She

was based on some designs I did for Tims ex-girlfriends, with a few

modifications to have her fit in as Tims co-worker.


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The other new concept I learnt was taking on a producing roll. At the

beginning of the project I would not have considered applying for a

producing role, however, now that I have actively taken on the role and

the majority of activities expected from a producer, I have enjoyed it and

would contemplate taking on the roll again for another project now that I

have more of an idea of what the roles entails.

Taking on a producing role has also made me aware and reinforced just

how much pre-production work needs to be organised before starting

animating in a production, the creation of the animatic was vital,

especially since Alex and I could not complete all of the rough animation

between ourselves in time for the hand-in. Using parts of the animatic

and rough animation may not look particularly polished for the final film,

but makes the story more successful than having finished animation and

big gaps between them. (Getting the narrative to work successfully was

the most important thing to Alex and as a result of the crew cutbacks, we

had to cut down the story, the hand-in film is about a third of the original

script. Given the length of the section we have completed, it can be

estimated that if were able to get the entire script animated, it would

roughly be around fifteen minutes in length.)

My experience will definitely help to plan my own third year project and

the mistakes and setbacks I have come across (especially software

compatibility issues) will mean that I will both plan and test things

thoroughly before starting animation. I will consider using Animate,however if I was to use it as a part of a major project with others working

with me, I would organise things differently (such as deciding on final

palettes and textures) as well as setting up the file structure differently

(to make it more manageable and easier to access files), now that I have a

better understanding of how the program works.

For the future my main area of interest is still primarily focused on 2D and

I am glad I have been able to learn to use Animate. This time last year, my

favourite program I had been using to animate with was Flash. I see using

Animate as a natural progression from Flash and recognise its advantages

as more professional animation program. I will continue to experiment

with it and learn to master using a 3D camera in 2D space and play

around with puppet animation, as cut-out has always interested me. I

would like to continue using both vector based programs for future

projects, though I would still like to experiment with more traditional

areas of animation, both hand drawn and stopmotion, that I know I need

to practice.

Barista Work

In early January I met with Alex to discuss the work that he wanted me to

do, initially as explained earlier, I was just to animate the scenes Alex

assigned to me. I decided to purchase my own copy of Animate , if I hadnt

Im not sure how Alex and I wouldve been able to work around the

incompatibility issues we faced.

The first scene I was given to animate, was a the opening shot of the

pigeon flying through the city, although this has since be redone by Alex

to include the pigeons full body (following Georg & Andys advice).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1yEbCOMyLw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1yEbCOMyLwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1yEbCOMyLwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1yEbCOMyLw


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Planning for Pigeons wing movements:


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6Jan/Feb: Designs for screen transitions, initially going to be done in stopmotion with real coffee beans, these were also consideredbeing used to show Tim entering his daydream when he meets Alice for the first time.


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Original storyboard Alex gave me and

corresponding stills from the animatic.

Jan/Feb:

Alex holds a few sessions in the studio designed to teach the team of

animators how to draw in the style he wants to use. We are given .pdfs

on how to draw stickmen and the production bible presented at his pitch.

Feb/March:

Begin working on the animatic, Alex already has up to the first part of the

dream sequence having used a program (Storyboard Pro?) designed to

create storyboards, he wanted me to use but when starting to show me

how, he couldnt remember how to work it himself. I told him it would be

quicker for me to create the animatic in Flash to produce a similar result

but much quicker. I was given small versions of the final backgrounds to

use and then created the characters and their actions on top.

Animatic: (My W.I.P.) video links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwLUOZnEftQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjcP8oxTalA&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5vhrjjO680&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4UGt3H-h28&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpb8XXWkxI

Animatic (combined with Alexs beginning):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Dej6lZrTM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwLUOZnEftQhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwLUOZnEftQhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjcP8oxTalA&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjcP8oxTalA&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5vhrjjO680&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5vhrjjO680&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4UGt3H-h28&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4UGt3H-h28&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpb8XXWkxIhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpb8XXWkxIhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Dej6lZrTMhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Dej6lZrTMhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Dej6lZrTMhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpb8XXWkxIhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4UGt3H-h28&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5vhrjjO680&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjcP8oxTalA&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwLUOZnEftQ


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Feb/March:

Personal problems meant that I had to head home a few times, but I

found work that I could do for Barista whilst at home. This included

designing the 16 ex-girlfriends that Tim finds himself face to face with (or

so he imagines) on a bus. This scene was cut around mid-march, but atthe time of designing we were trying to get as much done as possible, the

exes were cut after deciding to end the story at point that would make it

work as a shorter story, so Tim never made it out of the cafe to get on the

bus to meet them. Alexs only direction was that they look hot, so I

found some pictures of hairstyles and Alex picked his favourite ones,

which formed as the basis for the exes looks and varying styles.


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March:

After feedback with Derek, it was decided that Carol would become a real

character. She is based upon the design of Ex-Girlfriend #9 . I used Alexs

turnaround of Alice as a base for getting Carols proportions correct.


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March/April:

Inclusion of Carol means changes to the animatic, adding her into scenes.

With Carol:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT2wfxHR8X8

The full animatic:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xPUlRRmAow

I also came up with a storyboard idea for when Tim has to leave Alice to

clean up broken cups. Alex liked the idea, so we ran with it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT2wfxHR8X8http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT2wfxHR8X8http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT2wfxHR8X8http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xPUlRRmAowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xPUlRRmAowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xPUlRRmAowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xPUlRRmAowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT2wfxHR8X8


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After putting the animatic together Alex and I went through it and labelled the shot numbers and the corresponding background that shot would use. I then

drew up a table in Word that we could both follow, this is the first version... the numbering became a bit confusing, so we changed it to simplify things.


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Updated version to correspond with the new shot numbering system, and a column to show which of us is working on that shot. It was thought that Thomas

Spettel could work on the rotoscoping hands, but after Alex gave him the files to work with in Animate 1, for some reason unknown to us, he declined.


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Third (and so far final version) of the shot list Alex and I share, I keep mine updated (pictures follow after this one) and end up up dating Alexs when we

meet to discuss what else needs to be done/how far we have progressed. It needs to be updated, since we changed the beginning sequence (shots 6

15) into a montage where the camera is split in half and action happens on both sides of the screen.


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This is my used version, I highlighted all my scenes in yellow. (Note, I meant to write that there is no shot 7 due to a numbering error, but I had been using

the computer for too long and wrote deleted...


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Ali Ni h i l C A i P d i Fil


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The first drawing of Carol... For a long time she had no nose or mouth. Thinking about it now, shes such a moody

character it would have been better if I had put her eyebrows into a default frown...



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Struggling with designs for

her ponytail, in rough

drawings she had a flick at

the end, but it looked to

over the top when drawn

properly in Animate... she

has been drawn so that

you cannot see the flick

from the view because it

is hidden by her body.



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Drawing Carols head when

creating the puppet for the first

time. Now that I have more of an

idea how to use Animate, I would

definitely add more angles, and

change the eyes so that the

pupils and irises are on the same

layer rather than separate.

Carols body is sketched in very roughly using a Wacom, then neatened up. (Explained how on the next page...)



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To Animate Carol, I import her head into the scene first so

that I can get the size of her body to the right size ratio. This

also means that her body doesnt change drastically

throughout the scene, which is something I sometimes

struggle with when animating straight ahead. I animate veryroughly in blue using straight ahead animation to try and get

the timing of the action correct. I then go over it at least once

with another layer with a red line to neaten it up, sometimes

for things like the hands I use a separate layer (for the arm

gesture Carol uses when she says Whats so funny?, I kept

one frame for the right arm and body and had a separate

layer on top for the moving arm). I then go over it using

straight lines in the method Alex directed me to, use the

Cutter and then head on to smoothing it.



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To begin with using the Contour tool and Smooth tool took a long time to

get used to, especially in the style that Alex wanted: having blocky style

fingers (which are a bit of a nightmare to draw) to contrast with smooth shirt

collars and elbows. To begin with I was really quite slow at drawing the

neatest version of the figure (Alex taught me to draw them with straight

lines and then to use the Cutter tool to get rid of the end bits I didn t

need.), but as the project has progressed I have become much quicker at

doing so, the image on the next page was used for the DVD cover and tookme roughly around twenty minutes to draw the rough versions of her pose,

neaten her up and texture her.



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Planning for compositing the

coffee montage together.



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For some reason the videos I have exported from Animate keep failing to

convert when uploaded to YouTube and Vimeo, they work when played

on computer, so I am going to try and upload them to Moodle in a .zipfolder. If this fails, I will put them on a DVD to hand in with this report.

crew assignment production report

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